"How do you know what I feel?" The fear rose a notch, but the anger rose faster. "A human servant that can taste a master vampire's fear -- and you wonder why I don't want you in my lands."
"I can't taste your fear, Colin. I heard it in your voice."
"Liar!"
My shoulders were beginning to tighten. It doesn't usually take much to piss me off, and he was working at it. "How are we supposed to help Richard, if you won't let us send anyone down there?" My voice was calm, but I could feel my throat tightening, my voice going just a little lower with the effort not to yell.
"What happens to your third is not my concern. Protecting my lands and my people, that is my concern."
"If anything happens to Richard because of this delay, I can make it your concern," I said, voice still quiet.
"See, already the threats begin."
The tightness in my shoulders spilled up my neck and came out my mouth. "Listen, you little pip-squeak, I am coming down there. I am not letting your paranoia hurt Richard."
"We will kill you then," he said.
"Look, Colin, stay out of my way, and I'll stay out of yours. You f**k with me, and I will destroy you, do you understand me? It's only war if you start it, but if you start something, by God I will finish it."
Jean-Claude was motioning for the phone rather desperately. We wrestled for the receiver for a few seconds while I called Colin an antiquated politician, and worse.
Jean-Claude apologized to the empty, buzzing phone. He hung the phone up and looked at me. The look was eloquent. "I would say I am speechless, ma petite, or that I don't believe that you just did that, but I do believe it. The question is: Do you understand what you have just done?"
"I am going to rescue Richard. I can go around Colin or over him. It's his choice."
Jean-Claude sighed. "He is within his rights to see it as the beginning of a war. But Colin is very cautious. He will do one of two things. He will either wait and see if you initiate hostilities, or he will try and kill you as soon as you set foot on his lands."
I shook my head. "What was I supposed to do?"
"It doesn't matter now. What's done is done, but it changes the travel arrangements. You can still take my private jet, but you will have company."
"Are you coming?" I asked.
"No. If I arrived with you, Colin would be certain that we had come to kill him. No, I will stay here, but you will have an entourage of guards."
"Now, wait a minute," I said.
He held up his hand. "No, ma petite. You have been very rash. Remember, if you die, Richard and I may die, as well. The binding that makes us a triumvirate gives power, but it does not come without a price. It is not merely your own life that you are risking."
That stopped me. "I hadn't thought of it that way," I said.
"You will need an entourage now that befits a human servant of mine, and an entourage that is strong enough to fight Colin's people, if need be."
"Who do you have in mind?" I asked, suddenly suspicious.
"Leave that to me."
"I don't think so," I said.
He stood, and his anger lashed through the room like a scalding wind. "You have endangered yourself and me and Richard. You have endangered everything we have or hope to have with your temper."
"It would have come down to an ultimatum in the end, Jean-Claude. I know vampires. You would have argued and bargained for a day or two, but in the end, it would have come down to this."
"Are you so sure?" he asked.
"Yeah," I said. "I heard the fear in Colin's voice. He's scared shitless of you. He'd have never agreed to us coming down."
"It is not just me he fears, ma petite. You are the Executioner. Young vampires are told if they are foolish, you will come and slay them in their coffins."
"You're making that up," I said.
He shook his head. "No, ma petite, you are the bogeyman of vampirekind."
"If I see Colin, I'll try not to scare him more than I already have."
"You will see him, ma petite, one way or the other. He will either arrange a meeting when he sees you mean him no harm, or he will be there when they attack."
"We have to get Richard out before the full moon. We've only got five days. We didn't have time to do this slowly."
"Who are you trying to convince, ma petite, me or yourself?"
I had lost my temper. It had been stupid. Inexcusable. I had a temper, but I was usually better at controlling it than that. "I'm sorry," I said.
Jean-Claude gave a very inelegant snort. "Now she's sorry." He dialed the phone. "I will have Asher and the others pack."
"Asher?" I said. "He's not going with me."
"Yes, he is."
I opened my mouth to protest. He pointed one long, pale finger at me. "I know Colin and his people. You need an entourage that is impressive without being too frightening, and yet if the worst happens, they must be able to defend you and themselves. I will pick who goes and who stays."
"That's not fair."
"There is no time for fairness, ma petite. Your precious Richard sits behind bars and the full moon is approaching." He let his hand fall to his lap. "If you wish to take some of your wereleopards with you, that would be welcome. Asher and Damian will need food while they are away. They cannot hunt within Colin's territory. That would be taken as an act of hostility."
"You want me to volunteer some of the wereleopards as walking provisions?"
"I am going to supply some werewolves as well," he said.
"I'm lupa for the pack as well as Nimir-ra for the leopards. You need to run the wolves by me, too." Richard had made me lupa of the werewolves when we were dating. Lupa is often just another word for the head wolf's girlfriend, though usually it's another werewolf, not a human. The wereleopards came to me by default. I killed their last leader and found out that everyone else was pretty much beating the hell out of them. Weak shape-shifters without a dominant to protect them end up as anyone's meat. It was my fault, sort of, that they were being hurt, so I extended my protection over them. My protection, since I wasn't a wereleopard, consisted of my threat. My threat was that I'd kill anyone who messed with them. The monsters in town must have believed it, because they left the leopards alone. Use enough silver bullets on enough monsters, and you get a reputation.
Jean-Claude put the receiver up to his ear. "It is getting so that a person cannot insult a monster in Saint Louis without answering to you, ma petite." If I hadn't known better, I'd say Jean-Claude was angry with me.
I guess, this once, I couldn't blame him.
3
The private jet was like a long white egg with fins. Okay, it was longer than an egg and more pointy at the ends, but it seemed just as fragile. Have I mentioned I have this little phobia about flying? I sat in my comfy, fully swivel, fully reclinable chair very upright, seat-belted in, fingernails digging into the cushioned arms. I had purposefully turned the seat away from one of the many round windows so I couldn't see out the side nearest me. Unfortunately, the plane was so narrow that I caught glimpses on the opposite side windows of fluffy clouds and clear blue sky. Hard to forget you're thousands of feet above the ground with only a thin sheet of metal between you and eternity when clouds keep floating past the window.
Jason plopped down in the seat next to me, and I let out a little yip. He laughed. "I can't believe you're this scared of flying." He pushed his chair with his feet, making it spin around, slowly, like a kid with Daddy's office chair. His thin blond hair was cut just above his shoulders, no bangs. His eyes were the same pale blue as the sky we were flying through. He was exactly my height, five three, which made him short, especially for a man. He never seemed to mind. He wore an oversized T-shirt and a pair of jeans so faded they were almost white. He wore two hundred dollar jogging shoes, though I knew for a fact he never jogged.
He'd turned twenty-one this summer. He'd informed me that he was a Gemini, and he was now legal for everything. Everything could cover a lot of ground for Jason. He was a werewolf, but he currently lived with Jean-Claude and played morning appetizer or evening snack for the vampire. Shapeshifter blood has a bigger kick to it, more power. You can drink less of it than human blood and feel a hell of a lot better, or so I've observed.